Alan Joyce and the politicians

The Qantas Chairman's Lounge is an invitation-only private facility at major Australian airports. [4,8] It offers its members separate check-in, dedicated lounges, priority boarding, and above all, consistent access to upgrades on Qantas flights. [4,8] Membership is by personal invitation of the Qantas CEO. [4] There is no public list of members. [8]

The Lounge has approximately 5,000 members. [2,8] Former CEO Joyce described it as 'the most exclusive club in the country.' [8] The membership includes senior executives, media figures, and approximately 90 per cent of federal parliamentarians. [8] Members on both sides of politics. Ministers and shadow ministers. Committee chairs and backbenchers. [6,8]

Open Politics data cited during the Aston scandal found at least 32 politicians from across the political spectrum had accepted free upgrades from Qantas in the current term of parliament alone. [6] Senior Labor figures including Andrew Leigh, Madeleine King and Andrew Giles were identified. [6] Opposition Leader Peter Dutton was a Chairman's Lounge member. [6] A handful of crossbench senators, notably David Pocock and some Greens senators, had never accepted membership or had resigned it. [6]

The focus of Aston's book, and of the subsequent national controversy, was Prime Minister Anthony Albanese. [1,2]

Albanese's parliamentary register of interests declared upgrades on approximately 22 personal Qantas flights between 2009 and 2019, a period spanning his time as transport minister, shadow transport minister, and official opposition leader. [1,8] The flights included travel to Rome, London, Los Angeles, and Honolulu. [8] He had declared them all, as required by law. [1,3]

What the book alleged, drawing on sources inside Qantas, was the manner in which the upgrades were obtained. [1,5] 'According to Qantas insiders, Albanese would liaise with Joyce directly about his personal travel,' Aston wrote. [1] The claim was not that the upgrades were undeclared; they were declared. The claim was that the Prime Minister had personally cultivated a relationship with Qantas's CEO that produced guaranteed upgrades on request. [1,2]

Aston also reported that, in 2022, after winning the federal election, Albanese asked Joyce to grant his adult son Nathan membership of the Chairman's Lounge. [2,3] The request was granted. [2] Albanese did not declare his son's membership on his parliamentary register of interests. [2] When the story broke, Albanese said Nathan had become his 'plus one' to the lounge following his divorce. [3] Albanese's fiancee was also a member. [3]

Qantas was developing Anthony Albanese as an asset for a very long time... I think Qantas compromised Albanese.Joe Aston, journalist and author, The Chairman's Lounge (2024) [2]

The Prime Minister went to ground for several days after the book's publication, saying it took time to check his records. [9] When he finally responded, his spokesperson issued a carefully worded statement: 'The prime minister did not ever call Alan Joyce seeking an upgrade. All travel has been appropriately declared and is a matter of public record.' [7]

The denial covered phone calls. It did not address texts, emails, in-person requests, or requests made via staff. [5] When pressed further, Albanese's office confirmed he had never texted or emailed Joyce, and had never had in-person conversations regarding upgrades. [5]

A Qantas whistleblower, quoted anonymously, was direct: 'It's bulls**t. It did happen. We all knew about it. Andrew Parker [Qantas's former government relations executive] used to get calls from Labor staffers as well about upgrades. If there's a Senate inquiry and Alan Joyce goes, he's going to get asked.' [5]

Joyce was never asked. His testimony was never sought in any formal proceeding. [5] The inquiry that might have compelled it was voted down. [10]

Australian lobbying law requires that people paid to lobby government on behalf of a third party be registered on the federal lobbying register. [11] Qantas's own executives are not required to register; they lobby on behalf of their own company, which is permitted without registration. [11]

A commentator quoted in InDaily summarised the legal architecture succinctly: 'The definition of a lobbyist is such that the Qantas-government relationship isn't lobbying. They just happen to lobby the government on policy.' [11]

The upgrade system operates within this gap. [11] Qantas does not pay politicians. It upgrades them. [4] The upgrades are declared on a register of interests, which makes them legal. [1,4] But as Aston documented, the act of declaration does not extinguish the relationship the upgrade creates. [4] A politician who has called the Qantas CEO to arrange personal travel, whatever the formal rules say, is in a different relationship with that CEO than a politician who has not. [4]

Unlike other major companies, it was able to hand out freebies worth tens of thousands of dollars in a way that would never be possible for other corporates such as banks.Joe Aston, The Nightly, November 2024 [4]

Aston argued the upgrade system gives Qantas a lobbying power that no other industry in Australia possesses. [4]

The upgrade relationship did not exist in isolation. Over the period of Alan Joyce's tenure as CEO, from 2008 to 2023, Qantas received a series of government decisions that directly served its commercial interests. [12,13,14]

During COVID, Qantas received approximately A$2.7 billion in taxpayer support to keep the airline viable. [14] In the same period, Qantas outsourced its ground handling operations, a move the High Court subsequently found was undertaken to prevent workers from taking protected industrial action. [13] 1,700 workers lost their jobs illegally. [13]

When Qantas returned to profitability, posting a net profit of A$1.7 billion in FY22-23, the government did not seek repayment of the COVID support. [14] When Qantas was accused of selling approximately 8,000 tickets for flights it knew had been cancelled, the ACCC took action, but the process was civil, not criminal. [15]

And in July 2023, when Qatar Airways applied for flights that would have competed directly with Qantas on the Australia-Europe route, at a time when Qantas had admitted it could not meet demand for five years, the government blocked the application. [10] The Senate inquiry found the decision was driven by Qantas's intervention. [10]

The upgrade relationship, declared, legal, and denied in its specifics, is the connective tissue between an airline's preferences and the government decisions that honour them. [1,4,10]

It would be a mistake to read this as a story only about the Labor Party or only about Anthony Albanese. [6,8] The Chairman's Lounge predates Albanese as PM by decades. [8] It operated under Howard, Rudd, Gillard, Abbott, Turnbull, and Morrison. [8] Opposition Leader Peter Dutton was a member. [6] Coalition MPs accepted upgrades alongside Labor ones. [6]

The system is bipartisan because it is designed to be. [4,11] Qantas operates in a regulated environment shaped by whichever party holds government. [11] It has an interest in maintaining relationships on both sides of the chamber. [4,11] The Chairman's Lounge is the mechanism through which it does so. [4]

I am deeply concerned that any minister or shadow minister would receive extra perks and privileges from any company over which they have authority or influence. To be enjoying dozens of flight upgrades, accommodation and gifts is at best very poor judgment, or at worst misuse of office.Andrew Wilkie, Independent MP for Clark, InDaily, 2024 [6]

Article 8 of this series examines what reforms would actually fix this, and why neither major party has any incentive to introduce them.